Wrath of the Void Strider (12 page)

·· • ··

Zerki and Valerie hurried to the main airlock on the bottom deck of the command module.  They reached the portal in time for the shuttle to complete its docking maneuver.  Air hissed, and the inner door rolled aside.  Straightaway, Lodoxol and a dozen red-clad, armed and armored guardsmen marched into the forward hangar.  “Captain Ibarra,” he seethed, and his snout curled upward as he mustered a triangular smile, slick with saliva.  He glanced at Valerie.  “Honored minion.”

“Lodoxol, son of Perymdak.”  Her scowl undisguised, Zerki crossed her arms and nodded toward his guard.  “What’s the meaning of this?”

“I believe you might actually have something I want,
eh hm
.”

“How do you mean?”

He glanced toward the lift.  “Salvage crews are known for a lot of things, but never for being early.  It takes you two of your hours to complete a jump, and yet you arrive two hours early.”  He approached the elevator.  His guardsmen grunted and growled, shoving Zerki and Valerie along with the muzzles of their rifles.

“What of it?”

He raised his brows.  “I wonder if you aren’t hiding something new.  Something wondrously advanced,
eh hm
.  Perhaps I should have a look around.”  He crossed the rest of the distance to the lift and tapped the up arrow.  “Keeping new technology to yourselves would violate the terms of the Pallas Accord, as I’m sure you’re aware.  It could lead to a second galactic war.”  The doors opened, and he stepped inside.  He gestured for Zerki to follow.  “Of course, I wouldn’t want that to happen.  It might cost you everything, this time.”

Two of his guards joined him in the now crowded elevator, and Lodoxol shook his head as Valerie approached.  “Not that one.”  He furrowed his brow.  “She stays behind with my men.”

“Captain?” Valerie asked.

Zerki nodded solemnly.  “It’s fine.”

“Aye, Captain,” Valerie hesitantly replied, and she glanced to the remaining soldiers as the doors closed.

They ascended to the command deck.  All four stepped off, and the bridge crew regarded the ellogons nervously.  Boldly, Collins marched up to Lodoxol, jamming his finger into the merchant prince’s shoulder.  “You can’t be here!” he barked.

Zerki raised her hand, “Stand down.”

“Captain?”  He choked.

“Stand down.”

His blood still hot, Collins took a step back, allowing Lodoxol complete access to the bridge.  Unhurried, the merchant prince took in his surroundings, and in time his searching gaze befell the jump rig.  He met eyes with Gavin, who swallowed visibly.  “
Eh hm
,” the ellogon crooned, and he slowly walked toward the recessed navigation chamber.

·· • ··

Within the confines of the
Imperium
’s fire control room, Taryn joined the pitched melee.  Her already considerable strength was magnified tenfold by her powered combat suit, and she tore into a red-clad guardsman’s shell.  She cast aside pieces of his carapace.  Desperately, he brought his rifle to bear, but she swatted it away and landed a staggering blow to the side of his head.  Blaster fire lit up the chamber, but she spun and ducked as glowing bolts streaked by.

A lance of white-hot plasma seared forth with a hiss from the statesman’s weapon.  It missed its mark, reducing a section of inner hull to flowing slag.  He fired again, and again.  The third shot struck home, and a member of D’Arro’s Alpha Team dropped to the deck, slain, his torso emptied and cauterized in the same terrible instant.  “Insect,” he sneered.

D’Arro boomed, “
Leave none alive
!”

With a primal howl, Taryn pounced.  She grabbed and twisted, and the ellogon guardsman’s neck snapped.  D’Arro attacked as brutally.  Blasters and plasma lit up the bloody fray, and within moments, only D’Arro, Taryn, and the statesman were standing.

The well-dressed fellow squeezed off a well-placed shot, striking D’Arro’s shoulder, cutting through his armor and burning away his flesh.  D’Arro yowled in agony, stumbled, and he fell backward.  The statesman bellowed, “
Stop
!”  He pressed his plasma gun against the side of D’Arro’s helmet, and Taryn froze.  Feebly, D’Arro tried to dislodge the barrel.  “That’s enough,
eh hm
.  You made a noble effort, but all in vain!”

“You’re going to die,” Taryn warned.

“Do you have any idea who I am?” he asked rhetorically, and a smug smile crawled onto his face.  Keeping his gun trained on D’Arro, he walked slowly, deliberately to the weapons systems display screen.  “I am Perymdak, son of Doxol, merchant king and a member of the Ellogon Empire’s Council of Fifty!”

Her eyes danced between D’Arro and the glowing barrel of the ellogon’s weapon.  “I don’t like politics,” she answered.

He stooped forward, bared his tusked teeth and barked, “You insult me?  Fine!  Say goodbye to your friends, and say hello to your new life as my slave.”  Consumed by fury, he glanced to the weapons display and retargeted the
Sanguine Shadow
.  When he turned back, Taryn was already in his face, her armored hand firmly seated atop his head.

“Not on your life,” she whispered darkly.

“Taryn,” D’Arro coughed, and she squeezed.  “Don’t!”

Perymdak’s skull burst within her grip.  Turning to D’Arro, she said, “Come on,” and she helped him to his feet.  “Your armor’s a mess.  It can’t form a seal with the sled anymore, so we’re going to have to find another way off this ship.”

He weakly shook his head and struggled to lift free his helmet.  A moment later, he dropped it to the deck and sagged.  Drenched in sweat, his brilliant plumage was matted to his body.  “Leave me.  Get back to your sled, Taryn.  That’s an order.”

“Right,” she answered and wryly smiled as she helped him out of the chamber, stepping over the bodies of the fallen.  She paused to collect a blaster rifle from a dead guard and pointed it at the weapons screen.  She pulled the trigger, and the display went black.

Taryn hoisted D’Arro as he lost consciousness, draping his good arm across her shoulders.  She crossed into the corridor, where she nearly stumbled into a young female dressed in nothing more than a repair harness. 
The byriani maintenance slave resembled a human-proportioned female, her skin slightly translucent, hinting at the chrome circuitry woven through and part of her flesh.  A dense cluster of exquisite and faintly glowing cables, tied up at her scalp, flowed from her head and passed for hair.  Her eyes glowed brilliantly at first, and quickly faded to gentle illumination.  “Oh,” she whispered.

“We need help getting off this ship,” Taryn stated, and she halfheartedly waved her rifle at the woman she addressed.

The byriani swallowed and straightened as proudly as she could manage.  Softly, she said, “Only if I can come.”

“What was that?”

“I’ll show you how to get off this ship,” the byriani woman hesitantly restated, “but only if you take me with you.”

The ospyrean laughed.  “Deal.”

“Follow me.”

·· • ··

Takeo and his squad mates left the engineering crew gagged and bound in the engine room.  He estimated that it would take days to repair the damage to their systems.  Arriving at the breach, he asked, “Where are the others?”

Jenn Chelsea, leader of Beta Team, shook her head and tapped her helmet.

Right
, he thought. 
No comms
.  He faced the corridor, his back to the sleds, and his heart pounded in his ears.

Abruptly, Taryn’s voice cut in.  “We were ambushed,” she said.  “We lost Molin and Worral, and D’Arro’s been hit.”

“Are you alright?” Takeo asked, his throat suddenly dry.

“I’m fine, but D’Arro’s not getting back in his sled.”

“Did that come from him?” asked Jenn.

Taryn laughed humorlessly.  “D’Arro’s in bad shape.  Not much will be coming from him until he gets patched up.  I’d send you a visual if I knew how to work this thing, but trust me, he’s not getting back in his sled.”  Before anyone else could add to the discussion, she continued, “Don’t worry, we’ve got another way off the ship.  You guys should leave without us, but wait for my word before heading back to the
Shadow
.”

“Don’t let him die,” said Jenn.  “I mean it!”

“Yes ma’am,” Taryn promised.  “Sikes, out.”

Jenn’s chest heaved.  Regarding Takeo, she growled, “I hope your friend knows what she’s doing.”  Steeling herself, she ordered, “Everyone, saddle up!”  Hurriedly, they climbed back into their sleds.  Seconds later, they sealed shut, and forward thrusters fired, pushing them back out into the void.

·· • ··

Within the confines of the
Sanguine Shadow
’s forward hold, Valerie stood awkwardly against the far wall, near the primer-gray combat suit.  The guardsmen chattered in the ellogon tongue, often pausing to point their weapons at Valerie, then to roar with laughter.  She couldn’t understand what they were saying, but she had a vivid mental image of the vile things they were suggesting.

The lead guardsman looked at the tactical display embedded in his forearm plate and smiled.  “I am sorry for your friends,” he said to Valerie, almost genuinely sympathetic at first, but he guffawed cruelly.  “The glorious Perymdak, son of Doxol, is coming to congratulate us personally! Behold, as the might of the Ellogon Empire
crushes
your feeble attempts!”

She closed her eyes.  Evenly, Valerie exhaled, and she nodded grimly.  “I’m sorry,” she whispered, and she climbed into the training suit.

“What are you doing?” the lead guardsman demanded, and he pointed his blaster rifle at her.  “Get out of there!”

Glancing pointedly toward the massive bay doors, she slipped completely into the suit.  It locked in place around her, adjusted to her body, fitting snugly within seconds.  Klaxons blared, and warning lights spun, prompting the guards to hastily replace and seal their helmets.

The klaxons fell silent as the bay depressurized, and its massive doors swung slowly away.  Lodoxol’s private skiff, sleek and painted in reflective red, drifted into view, towing four boarding sleds.  It set down within the chamber, and the sleds jumbled against its aft thrusters as they powered down.  Smiling brightly, barely visible through the sloped canopy, the byriani woman waved at the ellogon guardsmen.

“Wait,” said the lead guard as he approached the skiff.  “Who are you?”

In response, the byriani woman glanced behind her and gestured with her thumb.

The skiff’s aft cargo hatch popped open, and Taryn stepped out with her rifle in hand, briefly obscured by a puff of cooled atmosphere.  The seconds it took for the ellogons to register her was all she needed to target and dispatch every one of them in a shower of blaster bolts.  Their bodies toppled to the deck, and with the blaster muzzle still glowing, she crossed to a large red button framed by a black-and-yellow striped panel.  She pressed it, prompting the doors to close and the hangar to pressurize.

In unison, the sleds ejected their occupants, and Takeo got to his feet.

Valerie exited the training suit and rushed to the skiff.  “What happened?”  The canopy glided open, and a boarding ladder descended.  The byriani woman, rid of her harness and covered now in a thin blanket, stepped down as Taryn pulled D’Arro from the space behind the pilot’s seat.

Jenn moved close to lend a hand, but Taryn refused her help.  “We need to get him to med bay.”

Valerie glared.  “I can see that.”  She glanced to Taryn’s armored glove.  “What’s that on your hand?”

“I’ll explain it later.”  She heaved and lifted the wounded ospyrean into her arms, hoisting him over her shoulders.

·· • ··

Aboard the
Sanguine Shadow
’s bridge, Gavin stood alongside Zerki and Collins as Lodoxol studied the jump rig’s displays.  Breaking the ellogon from his reverie, one of his guards pointedly cleared his throat and approached the merchant prince.  He muttered something in Ellogon, and Lodoxol stiffened.  Slowly, he turned about, his russet skin now a shade paler.  The guard showed him his forearm display.

The merchant prince stammered something in return and struck the soldier’s forearm.  He beckoned the other one closer.  After a moment spent studying the other’s readouts, Lodoxol’s face reddened, and he slowly shook his head.  “Well played,
eh hm
,” he whispered, his nervous gaze locked on Zerki.  He produced a data cube and pressed it into her hand.  “Here, take it.”

Quick to bury her surprise and confusion, Zerki lobbed the cube toward Krane, and he snatched it from its gentle arc.  Carefully, he set the storage device into a recess embedded in his console.  He found a single holographic data file and accessed it.  It blossomed to reveal a detailed three-dimensional map of Ixion Prime.  Krane zoomed in, isolating a particular micro-continent.  Moments later, he uncovered an image of Behemothylax.  The monstrosity filled his console screen, buried in the spine of a mountain.  After a moment of study, Krane nodded and twisted to face his captain.  “It checks out.”  He could scarcely contain his own giddy grin.

“I would have expected nothing less,” Zerki asserted, and she nodded to the merchant prince.  “Let’s return to the forward hangar.  Your payment awaits.”

Lodoxol swallowed visibly and tugged at his thick collar.  “Of course,” he replied and stepped into the lift with his guardsmen in tow.  Zerki soon joined him, and the doors slid closed.  The elevator descended.

As the doors opened, she startled to see Taryn, clad in her powered armor, trudging to the elevator with D’Arro pressed over her shoulders.  Beyond her stood Jenn’s combat team and almost a dozen slain ellogon guardsmen.  “Sikes,” she muttered, and nodded, straining to maintain her composure.

“Captain,” Taryn answered and stepped into the lift with the wounded ospyrean, followed closely by the byriani woman.

Valerie hurried to Zerki’s side, as Takeo, Jenn and the others tromped closer.  “Captain,” she hoarsely whispered.  “Something happened…”

Zerki gravely shook her head, cutting her off.  “Chelsea, is that cruiser ten-seven?”

Jenn nodded.  “Aye, Captain.”

To Lodoxol, Zerki firmly stated, “Next time, think twice before attacking your own clients.  It’s bad for your image.”  She pointed to a stack of three metal footlockers.  “Feel free to count it.  We’ll drop your skiff off at the nearest starport.  You can have it towed from there.”